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Middle income country status 17 years away

Forecasts UNCTAD's LDC report on Bangladesh

STAFF CORRESPONDENT
Bangladesh will require another 17 years to graduate from Least Developed Country (LDC) to a middle-income one if 6.5 percent growth is sustained.
United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) made this prediction in its LDC report 2008 released yesterday.
The report based on fiscal 2005-06 said Bangladesh ranked 15th among 50 LDCs in achieving real GDP growth during the period.
Executive Director of the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) Mustafizur Rahman read out the brief report at a press briefing at his
office. He expressed the hope that Bangladesh would become a middle-income country sooner than the UNCTAD predicted.
Many of the economic indicators including export growth of manufactured products, high volume of remittance and success in implementing various MDGs brightened the prospects of Bangladesh moving out of its LDC status earlier than the stipulated period, he noted.
The report indicating poverty situation and based on Household Survey 2000 said 26.4 percent of Bangladesh population live on $1 or below $1 a day while 74.8 percent between $1 and $2 a day. This estimate differed from a previous
World Bank estimate of 41.3 percent and44.2 percent respectively.
Bangladesh exported 34 percent of the LDCs' total manufactured exports and 7.4 percent of their merchandise exports, the UNCTAD report said.
It mentioned that Bangladesh ranked 4th among the LDCs in fiscal 2005-061 in receiving foreign direct investment (FDI). Three oilexporting LDCs -- Sudan, Equatorial Guinea and Chad --were ahead of it.
Bangladesh's share was 6.7 percent of FDI in the LDCs during the period.
And it received 41 per cent of the total workers' remittance to the LDCs in 2006, the report said.
The overseas development assistance (ODA) in the year constituted only 1.7 percent of the real GDP in 2006 as Bangladesh is relatively less dependant on aid compared to other LDCs.
About MDG implementation, the report said Bangladesh performed brilliantly in primary education, child mortality, gender equity and access to safe water.
UNCTAD suggested that national governments should take the lead in designing and implementing their development strategies.
It said 277 million people live in extreme poverty in the LDCs, which means 36 percent of (heir population lived on an income of less than SI adayin2005.
Another challenge of the LDCs is food security. They are being hit very hard by the sharp increases in domestic food prices as 36 out of the 50 LDCs were net food importers in 2004 -06, the report said.
Others who spoke at the press briefing included Brig Gen (Retd) M Mofizur Rahman, Uttam Kumar Deb, Fahmida Khatun and KhondakerGolam Moazzem.